Influx of murder victims overwhelms Ecuador morgue
Guayaquil has been at the center of an increasingly deadly battle between Ecuadoran drug gangs.
Daily TribuneGuayaquil has been at the center of an increasingly deadly battle between Ecuadoran drug gangs.
FORENSIC workers carry corpses from a container at the morgue in Guayaquil, a city where the strong stench of putrefaction has taken hold as more people fall victim to Ecuador’s drug-related violence.
MARCOS PIN/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
GUAYAQUIL, Ecuador (AFP) — Bodies by the dozen are piled up at an overfull forensic morgue in Ecuador’s drug violence-plagued city of Guayaquil; the stench of death hanging over an entire neighborhood.
On site, workers in biohazard suits and masks move one body bag after another from shipping containers to coffins, as relatives wait outside in the stifling heat, gagging at the smell.
“I smoke to mask the odor,” a man who requested anonymity for his own safety told Agence France-Presse, dragging deeply on a cigarette as he waited to receive a loved one’s remains.
The port city of Guayaquil has been at the center of an increasingly deadly battle between Ecuadoran drug gangs, and the bodies are piling up, many of them unidentified.
For days now, residents say, the odor of decomposing bodies has hung over an entire neighborhood surrounding the morgue, which receives the bodies of people violently killed in Guayaquil and neighboring Duran for investigation purposes.
The national forensics service said in a statement Tuesday that “due to the increase in criminal violence in the country, there are more bodies marked ‘NN,’” meaning unidentified and unclaimed, at the morgue.
It did not provide a figure, but press reports suggested there were over 200.
The service also said two refrigerated containers at the facility had broken down, amid media reports of leaking body fluids and even body parts spotted on the premises.
The forensic service said an investigation was underway.
